the rains

It’s pouring rain. Farmers are collectively breathing relief, finally able to begin working on their parched land, land deprived water because Israeli bombing, tanks and bulldozers destroyed virtually all of the wells, cisterns, and rain-water collectors of farms in the border regions.

I’m breathing many sighs of relief, because the rain is fresh, brings life, brings a needed feeling of growth…

But the family of Saleh Abu Leila, with their 14 family members crammed into 1.5 tents (half the tent is occupied by a refrigerator) of poor-quality, torn fabric will be sighing with much less relief, as water seeps in through rips and breaks in the tent, floods the door, gradually streams into the tent entrance.

Their focus will be on keeping warm, particularly for their infant just over a month old, and dry, added to the daily worries about where the money for the next tine of baby milk will come from.

We’ve come to interview them, share their struggle with those outside Palestine, re-affirm that for this family and so many others absolutely nothing has changed nor improved.

They have no income, are not refugees –and thus do not receive any UN aide–and have young children to raise.

I try to imagine myself as a child, living in these conditions long term –nearly a year now –and without sufficient nutrition. I try to image having children of my own subjected to this. That is the hardest, most painful thought, one any parent could identify with: the desire to provide for, nourish and bring joy to one’s children.

Despite their great poverty, their unavoidable Palestinian hospitality overrides and I am coerced into sampling some soup: a mixture of cooked greens and lentils, very tasty. I’m acutely aware that this must stretch to feed all their children and the parents themselves, but my refusal and excuse that I’ve eaten is met with insistence that I join them or leave them insulted.

Arafia, Saleh’s wife, mentions that the baby milk she is mixing to heat in a pot of water costs about 50 shekels (nearly $15) every 5 days, and that they must go to the city to buy it.

Together, Arafia and Saleh spend 600 shekels per month for their kidney and diabets medications.

They speak of their situation, which is alone hard enough, living crammed in substandard tents for a year but when considering what they had, it is unbearable.

“I worked in Israel for 14 years. I speak Hebrew fluently, traveled all over Israel for work. I earned good money and we lived well.”

He reminds us that there are many, many others like him, who used to earn a living in Israel but who now are cut off from any source of income, the borders closed and the economy in Gaza shattered by the massacre and the siege.

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9 comments

Eva,
I am proud of you, I am truly in love with you for who you are for what you believe in for what you do. I admire your courage your strength your hope and work.
God bless you and keep up the good effort. happy new year Gaza, Happy new year Eva

International Journalism Award From Mexican Press Club March 2017

about me

Eva Bartlett is an independent writer and rights activist with extensive experience in Syria and in the Gaza Strip, where she lived a cumulative three years (from late 2008 to early 2013). She documented the 2008/9 and 2012 Israeli war crimes and attacks on Gaza while riding in ambulances and reporting from hospitals.
Since April 2014, she has visited Syria 7 times, including two months in summer 2016 and one month in Oct/Nov 2016 and her latest visit in June 2017 (to Aleppo, Homs, al-Waer, Madaya, al-Tall, Damascus).
Her early visits included interviewing residents of the Old City of Homs, which had just been secured from militants, and visiting historic Maaloula after the Aramaic village had been liberated of militants. In December 2015, Eva returned to old Homs to find life returning, small shops opened, some of the damaged historic churches holding worship anew, and citizens preparing to celebrate Christmas once again.
On her 5th visit in June-August 2016, she went twice to Aleppo, also visiting Palmyra, Masyaf, Jableh, Tartous, and Barzeh district of Damascus, as well as returning again to Maaloula and Latakia.
On her sixth visit to Syria, in October and November, she visited Aleppo twice more, as well as areas around Damascus. The testimonies Eva gathered in Aleppo starkly contrasted narratives corporate media had been asserting.
Many of her published Syria writings, videos, photos can be found at this link:
https://ingaza.wordpress.com/syria/